Our Towns; A Mayor So Anticrime She Posts a Police Car at Her House

By ANDREW JACOBS

Published: December 16, 2001

IRVINGTON, N.J.—
MOVING like a Humvee in sneakers, Dorothy Heyward cruises the streets of this sinking city, fearlessly wagging a finger at every prostitute and drug peddler she sees during her daily walks. ''It's a sin before God,'' Mrs. Heyward, 78, shouts, her voice like a trumpet, as a man shamelessly urinates against the side of a burned-out house. With Irvington having the state's highest violent crime rate and more than 500 abandoned buildings ready to shelter sinful activity, Mrs. Heyward does a lot of shouting these days.

But Mrs. Heyward's voice jumps an octave when she passes the home of Sara B. Bost, a Democrat who was elected in 1994 as New Jersey's ''crime-fighting mayor.'' Since then, however, Irvington has been battered by soaring lawlessness. That menace was dramatically highlighted two years ago when Mayor Bost's home was peppered with gunfire -- retribution, she said, for her crime-fighting zeal.

A few days later, Mrs. Bost held a news conference vowing to stamp out the malignancy of drugs in this 2.8-square-mile township of 59,000. To prove her mettle, she helped city officials rip out a score of public pay phones, calling them the street dealer's tool in trade. (One officer cynically noted at the time that most dealers carried cellphones.) Lest the would-be assassins return, a police car was stationed in front of the mayor's modest home 24 hours a day.

There was one problem, though: the mayoral residence was never the target of vengeful drug traffickers. Within hours of the gunfire, investigators determined that rival gang members, firing at one another in speeding cars, had hit the Bost home and another house across the border in Newark. Wary of embarrassing the mayor, police officials had kept quiet about the report.

Last month, a rival elected official faxed the report to the press. Residents crowded township meetings to express their outrage and the police, at the mayor's behest, scaled back the constant police presence to 12 hours, from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. The councilman who released the report, David Lyons, estimates that the police protection has cost Irvington more than $800,000. The police chief puts the figure between $350,000 and $680,000, depending on an officer's salary. Whatever the price tag, critics say the township, which received $5 million this year under the state's ''distressed cities'' program, could find other uses for the money. ''I'm sure lots of citizens would love to have a police car in front of their house,'' said Mr. Lyons, who is considering a mayoral run.

These days, the police car is unmarked, but that hasn't stanched the outcry from people like Dorothy Atkinson, a retired beauty salon owner who has to navigate a phalanx of brazen dealers when she takes her 9-year-old grandson to Thurgood Marshall Elementary School. ''Why doesn't the mayor put those cops in front of the school?'' she asked. ''It's inhumane.''

Mayor Bost did not return a half-dozen phone calls left at City Hall last week, but her husband, Fred, a 22-year veteran of the Township Council, was asked about the continuing police presence when he emerged from his house last Thursday. ''Does Mayor Giuliani have police protection?'' he asked indignantly. Mrs. Heyward and her friend Miriam Jackson, who were accompanying a reporter, had a ready answer. ''Yes, but Mayor Giuliani does his job,'' the women yelled in unison. A storm of ugly words from both sides ensued, ending only when Mr. Bost drove away in his S.U.V.

Although crime remains Irvington's biggest woe, City Hall has been somewhat preoccupied by other troubles lately. On Tuesday, for the second time in two years, F.B.I. agents swept into the municipal building and carted away documents from the mayor's office. While officials would not discuss the investigation, it might have something to do with recent testimony from a former township business administrator, who implicated the mayor in a kickback scheme.

Even if Irvington's prospects weren't so dimmed by crime, rising taxes and dwindling revenues, it would still be hampered by ongoing wars among the Township Council, the mayor and the Police Department. The mayor barely speaks to the Council (excepting her husband) or the police chief. And last June, a report from the attorney general described morale on the 185-member police force as dangerously low.

State Senator Ronald Rice, a fellow Democrat who represents Irvington and the surrounding towns, said he feared Irvington could go the way of East St. Louis, a place that made headlines for its civic disorder. ''It's getting ridiculous over there,'' he said. ''They have completely lost control. Either the people wake up and elect new leaders or they're going to lose that town.''

In the meantime, Mrs. Heyward, a retired factory worker, will continue her angry walks. ''I could just up and leave,'' she said after her screaming match with Mr. Bost. ''But who else is going to do the yelling?''